Prague — After submitting a request that would allow search engine behemoth Google’s dream to expand its Street View mapping service in the Czech Republic have been dealt a fresh blow as the country’s privacy watchdog says the product “disproportionately invades citizens’ privacy”.
The Czech Office for Personal Data Protection said on Wednesday it has rejected for the second time to permit Google to acquire images for its panoramic Street View service stating that its cameras are set too high, and citing fears it could break the law. Today Igor Nemec, chairman of the Czech privacy watchdog, said the technology behind Street View presented a threat to the privacy of the country’s 10.5 million citizens.
“Google is employing methods that unacceptably interfere with people’s privacy, for instance cameras taking pictures beyond a common street view,” the office said in a statement.
“From our standpoint it would be correct if the cameras were lower,” the office’s chairman Nemec told reporters, adding the office had received dozens of complaints from citizens.
The decision was made by data protection authorities in Prague that have been investigating Google Street View since April, six months since the service was introduced in the country. Photographs already accumulated by the search engine company have been allowed to remain on the site, though talks over the future of Street View are ongoing. This marks more problems for Google’s attempts to map the world after they have met with resistance in Spain, South Korea and most recently Germany.
Citizens of the Czech Republic have voiced concerns that these vehicles could possibly photograph them participating in activities or visiting locations that they would otherwise not wish to make public. Goggle has since been under examination in the Czech Republic since it was released that they had been inadvertently collect sensitive information through WiFi connections with their “Street View” vehicles. This incident has served as a catalyst for mistrust throughout the world.
A Google Street View car in action – this one in the Prinsengracht in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Photograph: Toussaint Kluiters/EPA
There were also apprehension that the Camera’s mounted height of 9 feet could easily peer over fences and into windows exposing personal information about the tenants.
Google said later that week in a statement “Thanks to the ongoing cooperation, most conditions set out by the government had been met.” The company now only publishes blurred images of individuals photographed in the Czech Republic and has said it will remove any images subject to a complaint by a member of the public. Google said it would collect no new data in the country until the negotiations had been resolved.
Nemec’s statement that Street View “disproportionately invades citizens’ privacy” will set back the California-based company’s hopes of satisfying the Czech government and continuing to roll out the service across the country.
The agency also cited Google’s failure, as a company from outside the European Union, to name a local official to process personal data in the Czech Republic.
Simon Rakosnik from the Grayling public relations company which represents Google said in a statement Google believed “these issues will be resolved soon,” adding the company would stop collecting the data until then.
“We always want to make sure to protect the privacy of individuals and, at the same time, to provide the users of the service with quality pictures,” he said.
In neighboring Germany, protests forced Google to launch a campaign giving citizens concerned about safety or privacy eight weeks to tell the company to pixel out pictures of their homes or businesses before they are published.